For my first electroplating experiment, I made my wife a pendant based on a photograph of our dog, Neville. I traced and cleaned up the image in Photoshop, exported it as an SVG, and brought it into Tinkercad to extrude the design and add the chain loop.
I printed the model in Anycubic Eco Gray resin, sanded it, and coated it with MG Chemicals conductive carbon paint. From there I electroplated it in copper, sanded the new metal surface, added a thin nickel barrier, and brush-plated the final layer in gold.
For the center, I backed the opening with painter's tape, poured in clear green resin, and cured it with a UV flashlight. After removing the tape and curing the reverse, I filled the remaining depression with clear resin mixed with mica simply because I liked how it looked. The whole piece then received a final cure in the station.
The finished pendant moves through several kinds of fabrication in a single object: photographic tracing, vector cleanup, 3D modeling, resin printing, surface preparation, electrochemistry, and a translucent resin inlay.